A Little-Known European Agreement is Shaping Citizenship Rules
An important, but hardly-known, international agreement signed by 29 european countries has established common principles for citizenship rules, rights, and duties associated with multiple citizenship.
It’s called the European Convention on Nationality. The agreement also clarifies the military obligations for people with multiple nationalities, a topic becoming increasingly relevant as countries like Germany and France discuss the reintroduction of military conscription. Last Friday, the German parliament approved a landmark law that brings back military service on a voluntary basis, with the possibility to extend it to needs-based recruitment.
What is the European Convention on Nationality?
The European Convention on Nationality is an international agreement signed in 1997 under the council of Europe (not an EU institution). It was designed to provide a general framework on the acquisition,retention,loss,and recovery of nationality,especially in the context of the geopolitical changes occurring in the 1990s.
The 1997 Convention built on a previous one from 1963, which was based on the idea that “multiple nationality was undesirable and should be avoided as far as possible,” according to its explanatory report.
however, it recognised that increasing labor migration in Europe, the growing number of mixed marriages, the EU’s freedom of movement, and greater equality between men and women had made the previous Convention outdated.
Professor Maarten Vink, Chair of Citizenship Studies at the Robert Schuman centre, European University Institute in Florence, says the European Convention on Nationality “provided a new approach to multiple nationality, which was previously restricted under the 1963 Convention, but was increasingly seen as a demographic reality in the context of gender equality and mixed-origin families where both parents can transmit their citizenship to their children”.
The Convention “provides a neutral, rather than restrictive approach,” Professor Vink argues, while ensuring “some basic standards in the field of nationality for the new democracies born in Eastern Europe since 1989, as well as realizing some harmonisation of the grounds for acquisition and loss of nationality in the different European states in the context of longstanding migration”.
Which countries signed the Convention?
Today, 29 European countries have signed the Convention: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, latvia, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom.
Eight (Croatia, France, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Malta, Poland and Russia) have not ratified it, so it is not binding there.
Naturalization requirements
Under the Convention, “persons lawfully and habitually resident” in a country should have the possibility of naturalisation. The Convention provides guidance on the conditions for acquiring citizenship,including a period of residence not exceeding 10 years,the processing of applications “within a reasonable time”,the possibility of administrative or judicial reviews,and “reasonable” fees.
The Convention further establishes the principle of non-discrimination, so that rules on citizenship acq
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